‘TRASH COPS’ FOCUS ON TEACHING INSTEAD OF PENALTIES

‘Trash cops’ poke into curbside bins to make sure waste can be recycled

CHULA VISTA 
It’s 7 a.m. on a Thursday, and recycling specialist David DiDonato slips on a bright yellow traffic vest in his office, grabs a clipboard and binder, and heads out the door.

He climbs into a white SUV with the city’s logo on it and together he and Environmental Services Program Manager Lynn France drive to where Naples Street intersects with Jefferson and Madison avenues on the city’s west side.

He has picked this location because large Allied Republic trucks won’t be rolling through to pick up recycling and garbage until around 2 p.m.

He needs a little time, because today he is playing the role of “trash cop,” as residents and city employees jokingly refer to it. He is monitoring the waste residents have dragged out to the street in their uniform black, blue and green bins.

For the last 15 years, the city has regularly sent out specialists to audit recycling bins to make sure residents are recycling the right items, aren’t trying to throw away items that could be reused, and aren’t mixing contaminants or hazardous waste in with materials that might end up in products on the shelf again someday.

“The No. 1 contaminant is plastic bags,” DiDonato said.

Even though they are recyclable, they can get stuck in the expensive machine that sorts the city’s recyclables. Plastic bags can be returned to stores, though, which can recycle them.

Chula Vista has a single-stream recycling system, which means residents can toss all their recyclable materials, minus plastic bags, into one container without having to worry about sorting. Sorting is done later at an EDCO recycling facility.

“The citizens absolutely love it,” France said. “Some districts still require people to separate out things like paper, and that is not convenient for residents.”

Each of Chula Vista’s four recycling specialists takes a day to go out and audit a designated area in the morning before trucks from the city’s contracted waste management service are scheduled to come by.

DiDonato usually hits between 20 and 35 houses in one morning. He strides to a large blue bin at the curb and raises the hinged lid.

“Garden hose,” he observes. It is coiled on top of the cardboard, plastics and aluminum that will soon head to the recycle facility. He then takes a look in the black trash bin before transferring the hose to it. The hose, too, could get caught in the machines. He dusts his blue latex glove-covered hands and pulls out a neon orange tag — an “oops” notice, he calls it.

On the bilingual card, he selects the bin that had a problem and describes the mistake. Each heading describes in detail what should be placed in the corresponding bin. Stapled to the back is a card outlining common items that are recyclable and common ones that are not. Frozen food boxes, waxed cardboard, soiled or wet paper and rubber bands are on the “NO!” list. Newspapers, junk mail, cereal boxes and paper egg cartons are “YES!” items.

“I try to let people know that I’m not here to scold them,” DiDonato says. “I’m here to educate. A lot of what you’ll see is people trying to do the right thing, they just don’t know that you can’t put paper plates in here that have been used for food.”

He makes his way down Madison and comes back up Jefferson, greeting homeowners and chatting with them about what he’s doing when he gets the chance. Residents who put things in the right bins get an “atta boy!” tag.

At one home, he pulls a pair of fluorescent light bulbs out of the trash bin.

“Hazardous waste,” he observes, laying them gently in the grass of the home to which they belong.

Nobody gets penalized for getting it wrong, he says. They just get informed about better ways to manage their resources.

France says this practice has made a noticeable difference in the city’s recycling success.

“We run about 4 to 5 percent contamination, and other districts will typically run about 9 to 15 percent.”

The goal is to get everyone so well-versed in best recycling practices that their blue bins eventually dwarf their black ones.